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Panzer1
04-23-2005, 01:04
I have often wondered if your trekking poles could act as a lightning rods in a thunder storm. While you are hiking with the poles, they are in a vertical position, made out of metal, and in contact with the ground. Could this cause lightning to be attracted to you?

What do you think?

Panzer (the paranoid)

MedicineMan
04-23-2005, 01:57
just teasing about making sure they are wet, but i agree and think in some (rare) situations you might want to collapse them and strap them onto the pack--at least to de-ground them, if your hair stands on end and you feel the aura of an impending strike toss them far from you

TDale
04-23-2005, 19:37
"if your hair stands on end and you feel the aura of an impending strike"

RUN LIKE HELL.

orangebug
04-23-2005, 19:53
I thought the plan was to squat while perched on the balls of your feet, making as low a profile as possible - while praying like hell.

Blue Jay
04-23-2005, 19:58
I thought the plan was to squat while perched on the balls of your feet, making as low a profile as possible - while praying like hell.

Do you really think someone is just going to squat there in the rain? I heard that waving your cell phone around, sqwaking like a chicken while holding tight to your twin leki lightning rods kept you safe.

Blue Jay
04-23-2005, 20:02
I have often wondered in your trekking poles could act as a lightning rods in a thunder storm. While you are hiking with the poles, they are in a vertical position, made out of metal, and in contact with the ground. Could this cause lightning to be attracted to you?

What do you think?

Panzer (the paranoid)

Since your head is higher than the poles it should strike there first.

TDale
04-23-2005, 21:10
The lightning isn't attracted to you, the poles or anything else. You just happen to be where it's about to be. Run.

Panzer1
04-23-2005, 23:19
The lightning isn't attracted to you, the poles or anything else. You just happen to be where it's about to be. Run.
They why is lightning attracted to a lightning rod?

Panzer

Panzer1
04-23-2005, 23:24
I thought the plan was to squat while perched on the balls of your feet, making as low a profile as possible - while praying like hell.
Well, I can only squat for a few seconds at a time..

Panzer

MedicineMan
04-23-2005, 23:34
next thing you know we'll be discerning the difference between air to ground lightening and ground to air strikes, then we'll have to look at electrical potentials and paths of least resistance, but i'm willing to learn :sun

SGT Rock
04-24-2005, 10:02
Sounds like a job for Mythbusters.

BTW use titanium or the new ceramic poles and don't worry about it :sun:

Tha Wookie
04-24-2005, 13:02
Just like has been said, if it will hit you then it will hit you. People have done research on the likelihood of being hit by lightning, and not much have been proven about the best place to hide or duck. Generally, research shows that it is random at best. Lighting travels through ground, so a cave or a ditch really doesn't protect you much.

However, on a case-by-case basis, there have been plenty of stories of metal conducting a bolt, like a woman who was 200 feet from a bolt and she was unaffected accept that her pocketknife burned her skin as it was in her front pocket.

I guess the obvious reasoning would say to stay away from things that conduct eletricity. This would include water, metal, and things taller than the surroundings (although this is not a panacea since it is random). I would imagine that a wooden pole would conduct electricity less than a metal pole. This could be just one more reason not to waste your money on factory poles and instead go natural. Or it could just be another reason to make peace with your maker.:-?

TDale
04-24-2005, 16:00
They why is lightning attracted to a lightning rod?

Panzer
Because they raise the ground to the highest point in the area.

Pencil Pusher
04-24-2005, 17:24
ROFLMAO:D This thread was oh so funny until Wookie tried interjecting a thoughtful response. Go with the flow, bro :D

Peaks
04-24-2005, 20:22
Actually, hiking with poles during a lightning storm might not be a bad idea.

First, as pointed out, unless you have them above your head, the poles should not act as a lightning rod. But, if in contact with the ground, then they should convey the energy through your arms and into the ground rather than through your torso (heart area), and into the ground through your lower body.

But, probably the best thing is not to be in a place where you are apt to be struck in the first place.

Ta1kingDirt
04-24-2005, 22:05
When electricity travels through the air it will flow using a path that uses the best compromise of short distance and small area of the ground recieving the negative charge. The most likely things to be hit are peaks, ridges, and trees (especially if they are not in heavily wooded areas). If you're not near a peak, ridge, or solitary tree, you're probably not in much danger. If you are, you should try tomove to lower ground. If that's not nearby squat (under your rainfly) on your pack or a closed cell foam pad. As for lightning actually striking your poles, I doubt it would happen unless you were on a peak with them held vertically over your head.

MedicineMan
04-24-2005, 22:14
first the idea of squatting on the foam pad is excellent!
a while back some buds where boardsailing, one guy had a carbon fiber mast, it was struck by lightening and exploded,he still has pieces of mast in his chest.

flyfisher
04-25-2005, 06:09
They why is lightning attracted to a lightning rod?

Panzer
I remember learning that the purpose of the lightning rod is not to attract lightning, but to decrease the electrical charge between the house or building and the cloud by leaking electricity through the rod into the clouds.

Thus, the purpose is not to attract lightning, but to make strikes less frequent.

The sharp point tends to fizzle a lot of electrons from the ground near the house into the air, reducing the charge difference and making the building safer from a hit.

How this applies to poles is not clear.

However, no one will ever find me on top of a mountain in a thunderstorm waving metal poles over my head and daring God to strike me.

WhiteMtns
04-25-2005, 07:48
As I recall Lightning more accurately travels from the ground up...in a sense.

When the air is electrified - all the + in the ground builds up on the surface. when you walk about in that + charged environment you build up a big + charge...this trickles off your head and climbs high into the air as a stringer...kind of an invisible wire. Lightning can't just travel through air...it needs this continuous stream of energy to use as a wire. When a + stringer climbing up meets a - stringer coming down an invisible wire connection is made and thats when the cloud can discharge its excess charge...AKA Lightning bolt.

I was taught as a kid that the longer you are outside in a charged environment, the higher your stringer is climbing...the more chance of getting hit.

I forget how it was recommended that you can discharge your + energy once in a while so it doesn't build up to a tall stringer...maybe hand it off to something else...

But unlike what some say...lightning is anything but random...it just appears that way because we cannot see where the stringers are and which two will meet.

Whether hiking poles in contact with the ground are bringing more of the ground's + charge up through you...accelerating the development of your stringer I have no idea...but it is the + ground charge that you should worry about long before thinking about a bolt out of the sky.

Blue Jay
04-25-2005, 09:57
I believe the best defence against lightening is to not piss off the powers that shoot them.

TDale
04-25-2005, 11:46
Ok, ok. The Official word on what it is and what to do. Just in the interest of not killing people that can't tell when we're joking:

How Lightning Develops Between The Cloud And The Ground

A moving thunderstorm gathers another pool of positively charged particles along the ground that travel with the storm. As the differences in charges continue to increase, positively charged particles rise up taller objects such as trees, houses, and telephone poles. Have you ever been under a storm and had your hair stand up? Yes, the particles also can move up you! This is one of nature's warning signs that says you are in the wrong place, and you may be a lightning target!

The negatively charged area in the storm will send out a charge toward the ground called a stepped leader. It is invisible to the human eye, and moves in steps in less than a second toward the ground. When it gets close to the ground, it is attracted by all these positively charged objects, and a channel develops. You see the electrical transfer in this channel as lightning. There may be several return strokes of electricity within the established channel that you will see as flickering lightning.
http://www.lightningsafety.noaa.gov/science.htm




Lightning Safety for Campers and Hikers


By Richard Kithil, President & CEO, NLSI
Article published in The Outdoor Network, vol ix, no.2, 1998


1.0 Summary. Some unexpected situations present extreme danger - an angry fer-de-lance, a Class VI rapid, crumbling cornices and rotten rock - these can be perilous events. There is no defense for lightning's "bolt-out-of-the-blue" occasional strike. But for the most part, lightning safety is a risk management procedure. Early recognition of the lightning hazard, with an awareness of defensive options, will provide high levels of safety.




COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS AND MYTHS

1. Lightning never strikes twice… it strikes the Empire State Building in NYC some 22-25 times per year!

2. Rubber tires or a foam pad will insulate me from lightning… it takes about 10,000 volts to create a one inch spark. Lightning has millions of volts and easily can jump 10-20 feet!

3. Lightning rods will protect my ropes course…lightning rods are "preferential attachment points" for lightning. You do not want to "draw" lightning to any area with people nearby.

4. We should get off the water when boating, canoeing or sailing…tall trees and rocky outcrops along shore and on nearby land may be a more dangerous place.

5. A cave is a safe place in a thunderstorm…if it is shallow cave, or an old mine with metallics nearby, it can be a deadly location during lightning.


2.0 Atmospheric Physics 101. At any one time around the planet, there are 2000 thunderstorms and 100 lightning strikes to earth per second. The frequency of lightning increases in the lower latitudes (closer to the equator), and in the higher altitudes (mountainous terrain). In the USA, central Florida experiences some 10-15 lightning strikes per sq. km./yr. The Rocky Mountain west has about two thirds this activity. Central Africa, parts of Southeast Asia, and the Latin American mountain regions can experience two to three times as much lightning as central Florida.

Lightning leaders from thunderclouds proceed in steps of tens of meters, electrifying ground-based objects as they approach the earth. Ground-based objects may launch lightning streamers to meet these leaders. Streamers may be heard (some say they "sound like bacon frying") and seen (we may notice our hair standing on end). A connecting leader-streamer results in a closed circuit cloud-to-ground lightning flash. Thunder accompanying it is the acoustic shock wave from the electrical discharge. Thus, thunder and lightning are associated with one another.

3.0 Flash/Bang. We all possess a first-class lightning detection device, built into our heads as standard equipment. By referencing the time in seconds from seeing the lightning (the FLASH, or "F" ) to hearing the accompanying thunder (the BANG, or "B"), we can range lightning's distance. A "F" to "B" of five seconds equals lightning distance being one mile away. A "F" to "B" of ten = two miles; a "F" to "B" of twenty = four miles; a "F" to "B" of thirty = six miles; etc.

New information shows successive, sequential lightning strikes (distances from Strike 1 to Strike 2 to Strike 3) can be some 6-8 miles apart. Taking immediate defensive actions is recommended when lightning is indicated within 6-8 miles. The next strike could be close enough to be an immediate and severe threat.

Lightning is a capricious and random event. It cannot be predicted with any accuracy. It cannot be prevented. Advanced planning in the form of a risk management program is the best defense for maximum safety.

4.0 Standard lightning defenses. The eco-tourism environment is different from situations where substantial buildings or fully enclosed metal vehicles are the recommended shelters. Lightning in remote terrain creates dangerous conditions. Follow these guidelines:




LIGHTNING SAFETY TIPS
AVOID: Avoid water. Avoid all metallic objects. Avoid the high ground. Avoid solitary tall trees. Avoid close contact with others - spread out 15-20 ft. apart. Avoid contact with dissimilar objects (water & land; boat & land; rock & ground; tree & ground). Avoid open spaces.

SEEK: Seek clumps of shrubs or trees of uniform height. Seek ditches, trenches or the low ground. Seek a low, crouching position with feet together with hands on ears to minimize acoujstic shock from thunder.

KEEP: Keep a high level of safety awareness for thirty minutes after the last observed lightning or thunder.

5.0 Medical treatment and symptoms. Treat the apparently dead first. Immediately administer CPR to restore breathing. Eighty percent of lightning strike victims survive the shock. Lightning strike victims do not retain an electric charge and are safe to handle. Common lightning aftereffects include impaired eyesight and loss of hearing. Electrical burns should be treated as other burns.

Treat lightning like a snake: if you see it or hear it, take evasive measures.

http://www.lightningsafety.com/nlsi_pls/ploutdoor.htm

SGT Rock
04-25-2005, 12:01
I nominate this for an article!

SGT Rock
04-25-2005, 12:05
New article is called Lightning Safety in the article section. It hasn't been moved to the released articles yet.

Blue Jay
04-25-2005, 13:16
Ok, ok. The Official word on what it is and what to do. Just in the interest of not killing people that can't tell when we're joking
COMMON MISCONCEPTIONS AND MYTHS

1. Lightning never strikes twice… it strikes the Empire State Building in NYC some 22-25 times per year!

2. Rubber tires or a foam pad will insulate me from lightning… it takes about 10,000 volts to create a one inch spark. Lightning has millions of volts and easily can jump 10-20 feet!

3. Lightning rods will protect my ropes course…lightning rods are "preferential attachment points" for lightning. You do not want to "draw" lightning to any area with people nearby.

4. We should get off the water when boating, canoeing or sailing…tall trees and rocky outcrops along shore and on nearby land may be a more dangerous place.

5. A cave is a safe place in a thunderstorm…if it is shallow cave, or an old mine with metallics nearby, it can be a deadly location during lightning.


Lightning is a capricious and random event. It cannot be predicted.

SAFETY TIPS[/color]
SEEK:Seek clumps of shrubs or trees of uniform height.

Out of all this the sentence "Lightning is a capricious and random event" is by far the most important. The AT rarely strays too far from a ridge, yet few are struck. Both times lightening has struck within 10 feet of me, I was in clumps of trees of uniform height. The avoids and seeks in the article are based on statistics from actual lightening hits, however often people get away with the avoids and get hit in a seek.

Panzer1
04-26-2005, 22:15
Would putting rubber tips over the ends your trekking poles help prevent a + stringer from moving up your pole and triggering a lightning strike?

Panzer

TDale
04-26-2005, 22:25
Panzer

2. Rubber tires or a foam pad will insulate me from lightning… it takes about 10,000 volts to create a one inch spark. Lightning has millions of volts and easily can jump 10-20 feet!

halibut15
04-27-2005, 07:32
Anyone ever actually seen your hair stand on end in a storm? At a soccer game last week, a thunderstorm was approaching, and everyone (and I mean EVERYONE) in the stands had their hair standing on end. The women looked just like those pictures you see from static electricity experiments in high school science classes, hair standing all over and straight up. Needless to say, everyone started to get out of there. No lightning ever hit, but I think it was just because it was mostly cloud-to-cloud lightning. It was a beautiful storm with much lightning, and I think the reason for the hair incident was just the amount of static electricity building up. Anyway, it was definitely a moment to remember, and I'll be running like heck the next time I see it happen, especially if it's when I'm hiking.

The Cheat
05-06-2005, 08:44
http://tv.ksl.com/index.php?sid=203133&nid=5

hiker5
05-06-2005, 08:59
There was a segment on lightning on NPR yesterday (The Kojo Nnamdi Show on WAMU in Washington, DC). If anyone is interested they can listen to an archive of the program using real player here (http://www.wamu.org/audio/kn/05/05/k2050505.ram) .

hikerjohnd
05-06-2005, 09:04
What about using your trekking poles in pitching your tent/tarp? Although shourded in that thin layer of silnylon (or whatever) on some spots, my tent has been the highest point around. Should that be a concern?

RockyTrail
05-06-2005, 09:32
What about using your trekking poles in pitching your tent/tarp? Although shourded in that thin layer of silnylon (or whatever) on some spots, my tent has been the highest point around. Should that be a concern?If there is an electrical storm in the area, yes!

You're probably more at risk simply from the location rather than the fact that you use trekking poles.

A common misconception is that insulating material such as rubber shoes or tires will protect you in a lightning strike; this is not true as the lightning has no trouble jumping 2000+ feet through open air and it's not going to stop at 2 mils of silnylon:) . The reason automobiles are considered "safe haven" from lightning is not because of the rubber tires, but because of the enclosed metal shell of the car body. One of the key electrical laws (Maxwell's) is that a voltage potential cannot develop across a conducting surface (the sheet metal) so it effectively re-routes and bypasses the lightning around the occupants via the car's surface.

grrickar
05-06-2005, 10:04
I don't claim to be an expert on the subject, but lightning takes the path of least resistance. Metal conducts, so I would not chance having poles pointed skyward when a thunderstorm is nearby. I would think hiking on/across a bald in a t-storm would be the most risky, since you very well might be the tallest object around.

I know on a golf course people run for shelter when it starts lightning, and think about all those metal golf clubs pointed skyward in a golf bag. Seems like the same concerns would apply to hiking. Lightning does not always strike the tallest object, and anyone who lives in a rural area can attest to that - sometimes it inexplicably strikes the flat ground when there are trees nearby. Electrical fields seem to be an attractor, such as power lines and electric fences (I have had lightning hit an electric fence and so has a buddy of mine who cattle farms).

Lightning rods are grounded, and are meant to pull the energy of the strike away from the building. Notice that connected to the rods in many cases will be large metal cables. Those are meant to channel the energy away from the building to lessen/prevent fire or damage to wiring. I used to work in a 911 comm facility that was 2 story, and there were about 20 2ft lightning rods on the roof, connected by 1.5" steel cables that were grounded.

Some show I watched on Discovery Channel showed some guys in a test bunker sending up model rockets with wires attached, and in almost every case they would produce a bolt down the wire. The wire was grounded, so they were sending the rocket high up into a charged atmosphere, which made a very attractive target for a bolt.
I think the bottom line is that if you are the most efficient path for the bolt to ground itself, you are gonna get hit.

grrickar
05-06-2005, 10:07
"The reason automobiles are considered "safe haven" from lightning is not because of the rubber tires, but because of the enclosed metal shell of the car body."


Yep. The car conducts and channels the energy around the occupants. This is essentially a Farraday cage.

TDale
05-06-2005, 10:46
This is essentially a Farraday cage.
Is that British made? :jump

icemanat95
05-06-2005, 11:30
I remember learning that the purpose of the lightning rod is not to attract lightning, but to decrease the electrical charge between the house or building and the cloud by leaking electricity through the rod into the clouds.

Thus, the purpose is not to attract lightning, but to make strikes less frequent.

The sharp point tends to fizzle a lot of electrons from the ground near the house into the air, reducing the charge difference and making the building safer from a hit.

How this applies to poles is not clear.

However, no one will ever find me on top of a mountain in a thunderstorm waving metal poles over my head and daring God to strike me.


Truly protecting your house from lightning strikes takes more than a couple pieces of copper and some leads to ground, it takes copper grounding fields buried in the ground at strategic points around the house. It also requires that the water pipes be grounded. Plastic valves and other interruptions in the copper or iron pipe act as insulators and break the path to ground. So you need to bridge those gaps as well. It ain't as simple as just metal plus lightning equals path to ground.

I've been up on ridge lines during lightning storms and caught the edge of ground strikes. It sucks. Your best option is to keep a weather eye out, know that that the storms come in the afternoon (usually) and that your best option is to stop below the crest or get below it before the storm hits and ride that sucker out as best you can. Standing on insulating pads and such, and anything else you can do not to be the path to ground are good options, but ultimately, whenever you head out into the wilds, you are taking your life into your own hands and may end up losing it. So live your life as fully as you can in every breath so that when you must finally give it up, you can do so satisfied that you've not left anything that absolutely needed to be done undone, things that should be said, unsaid, etc.

Panzer1
02-19-2006, 15:55
What about using your trekking poles in pitching your tent/tarp? Although shourded in that thin layer of silnylon (or whatever) on some spots, my tent has been the highest point around. Should that be a concern?

I'm just guessing that it would help to have rubber handles on the trekking poles.

Panzer

saimyoji
02-19-2006, 16:39
How about we attach some of our more useless politizens to these lightning rods. Experiment on the paths of least resistence. Maybe they'll learn something.

icemanat95
02-19-2006, 16:41
They why is lightning attracted to a lightning rod?

Panzer


Typically a properly set up lighting rod is connected to a whole grounding field, a network of copper buried in a matrix in the ground to create a better path to ground than the surrounding structures (your house, the trees around it etc.). The idea is that if the lightning is going to hit the structure anyhow, the lightning rods should, if properly installed, provide the more likely path to ground and take the hit down to the ground, shielding the house. However, a lot of modern homes are loaded with cable and water pipes (for radiant heating and the 2 bathrooms per person, etc.) These also form good paths to ground.

I wouldn't worry too much abouyt the aluminum and carbon fiber stuff in your kit acting as lighting rods. It's just not that likely.

The idea behind squatting close to the ground, preferably on some sort of rocky hump around which the water (and the groundstrike lighting) will flow, is to give you somethign to do. DO NOT put down a hand though. If you take some of the ground strike through your feet, it'll find it's path back to ground from one foot to the other. If you put down a hand, the electricity may choose to find it's way out the hand...through your heart. Not good.

The best bet is to keep a weather eye out, pay attention to the smell and feel of the air and to know what the trail looks like ahead of you...(hint, hint: get the maps and learn how to read them). If you can feel a storm blowing in (happens like clockwork in the mid-afternoon during the peak of Summer in the mid-atlantic), check your maps and see what's ahead. If you are on high ground, get down, if you are down, stay down until the storm blows over. You really don't want to be racing a thunder storm across a long ridgeline. I've done it and the lighting strike was FAR too close for comfort, blew me right off my feet. I've had that happen three times...twice on the trail and once in my yard...when you feel that tingle, run as fast as you possibly can.

Wings
02-20-2006, 17:52
Hiking Poles are nothing in compairison to the 6 foot radio antinna I carry. I mean how else am I going to get the News Lake Wobigon.

xXIndyXx
02-21-2006, 03:25
"The reason automobiles are considered "safe haven" from lightning is not because of the rubber tires, but because of the enclosed metal shell of the car body."


Yep. The car conducts and channels the energy around the occupants. This is essentially a Farraday cage.

Have you seen the episode of "world's craziest video's" (some stupid title like that)? Where a news caster and his cameraman were in a vehicle video taping a hail stom, then out of nowhere a bolt of lightening struck through the front windshield, into the cameraman in the passenger chair!